The Law of Averages

Book 2: Chapter 19: Be Water, My Friend

Dan was almost bouncing with excitement. He and Connor hadn't sparred with each other—properly sparred; that drunken brawl they'd engaged in a few months back didn't count—since the younger man had gained control over his new powers. Both had been busy adjusting to new responsibilities, but now it was time for the classic male bonding method of beating the shit out of each other.

Abby tightened the chin strap of his head gear, and checked over his gloves.

"Make a fist," she ordered, and he did so. He felt the tightly wrapped linen lining his forearm stretch as his muscles clenched. She tugged on his padded gloves, before nodding approvingly. Abby moved towards the edges of the stadium they'd demarcated in his back yard, slapping Dan's ass as she went.

"Go get 'em!" she cheered.

Dan grinned as he faced off against Connor. Freya finished her own checks, mimicking Abby's actions almost challengingly before skipping off to the sidelines. The two women stood in the back, beside Gregoir, while Cornelius hovered slightly closer, acting as a referee. The elder Graham was judged to have the best eyesight and reflexes, and thus able to most reliably intercede should something go wrong.

"Ready Newman?" Connor asked, a sharp smile on his face. Dan knew he shared the expression. This was something they both enjoyed, something they both could control. There was no mystery in it, no uncertainty. Just two buddies, doing their best to knock the lights out of each other.

Dan nodded, popping in his mouthguard before dropping into a rough boxing stance. It was riddled with holes, mostly because Dan didn't actually need a stance. He planned to do most of his swinging in t-space, only popping into the real to connect a hit. He was curious how Connor planned to handle that. Marcus had claimed that Dan should eventually be just about unbeatable in close combat, assuming he was physically capable of actually injuring the other party. Dan didn't plan on busting out any of his nastier tricks, but he would be miserably annoying for Connor to hit.

Cornelius stepped forward lazily, holding one hand up in the air. He eyed the two of them like a parent might eye his children play fighting, amusement crossed with vigilance. The arm went up, "Ready..." then dropped. "Fight!"

Dan immediately appeared inside Connor's guard, his vicious haymaker already colliding with the thin material of the younger man's shirt. Dan waited for the sharp shock of impact, his cue to drop back out of reality, but it never came. Instead, it felt like he was punching through water. His fist connected with something and slowed to a crawl. The feeling was so surprising that he almost didn't see Connor's knee flashing up towards his gut.

Dan blinked back to his starting position before his stupidity could be punished. Connor's strike was so forceful, his body left the ground. Dan watched him for a moment, looking for an opening, before his opponent grinned and accelerated through the air! The younger man threw the kind of dive kick that Dan had only seen in fighting games!

Dan intercepted it halfway through, appearing mid-grapple around Connor's thigh and slamming him downward. Dan felt the same odd resistance, and immediately fell back once more. Connor's downward momentum stalled, and his leg lashed out in an impossible roundhouse, catching only air. The young man spun wildly through the air, bleeding off momentum, before landing on the grass, unharmed.

"Huh," Dan said mildly.

Connor laughed. "Hard to hurt someone who can alter physical force, eh?"

Dan clicked his tongue, then reappeared behind Connor. He landed a jab on his opponent's kidney, then dodged a counter elbow by reappearing in front of him, leg coming around for a sweep. It connected, but Connor simply bent with the blow. His upper body dropped backwards, going completely parallel with the ground, but never losing balance. Dan disengaged in time to see Connor lash out with an impossibly leveraged punch that cratered where he had been crouched.

"Kinda like fighting a jellyfish, isn't it?" Cornelius commented. "Or maybe a dextrous lump of clay."

Dan frowned, but Connor didn't give him time to ponder. The younger man finally took the initiative, launching himself forward every bit as fast as Abby could. Dan traded positions with him, reappearing where Connor had started. Connor twisted around, catching sight of Dan, and his momentum was immediately redirected.

"Like fighting inside a pinball machine," Dan noted, trading places once more. Connor reacted again, this time moving even faster, and Dan repeated his trick. They moved like this for a while, Dan reappearing somewhere and Connor slamming after him, like some kind of twisted game of whack-a-mole. But the younger man's speed was only increasing, and he didn't seem to suffer much in the way of disorientation. Dan's time in the real was growing shorter each jump, and Connor seemed to be moving at close to highway speeds.

Dan really, really did not want to get hit now.

Dan reappeared high in the air, and for a moment Connor lost track of him. The spinning pinball slowed briefly, as he wildly glanced around, and Dan took the opportunity to reappear on top of the younger man. Dan did his best Gregoir impression, locking his arms tight around Connor and grunting as the momentum dragged them both through the air. Maybe it was the addition of Dan, or just the surprise of the action, but Connor's speed finally stalled. They both hit the grass with a grunt, Connor wrenching at Dan's arms, and Dan scrabbling for a headlock.

"Alright, that's enough," Cornelius called loudly. Suddenly he was on top of them, pulling them apart. "This is just embarrassing."

Dan teleported out of the man's grip, reappearing at his starting position and pumping both arms in the air. "First!"

Connor scowled up at him from the dirt. He crossed both arms and, like fucking Dracula rising up out of his coffin, levitated upright. Dan stared blankly, as Connor declared, "Tie."

"Agreed," Cornelius interjected. "You both suck."

Both fighters glared at him. He grinned back, unrepentant. He pointed to his nephew. "This is good experience for you, boy. There aren't many teleporters around, but if one tries to go after you hand to hand, tase his ass." He patted his belt, where his stun gun was holstered. "Don't mess around trying to land a punch. It's damn near impossible if they've got some awareness about them."

"Don't tell him to shoot me, we were just sparring! Besides, I could dodge a stun gun," Dan protested.

Cornelius laughed. "A civilian one, sure. Not this one. Not at point blank."

Dan made a face, while Connor nodded, his expression turning thoughtful. "I figured once I got moving fast enough, it wouldn't matter."

"Never pit your reflexes against someone else's if you can help it," Cornelius advised. "And even if you land a hit, that's no guarantee of putting the individual down long enough to secure him."

"How do you secure a teleporter?" Dan asked curiously. His only experience with that had been with the mad scientist Andros Bartholomew. Dan highly doubted implanted explosives were the go-to method of law enforcement.

Cornelius scratched his nose. "Well... I've never personally had a need to. But remember, Daniel, I'm a SPEAR Team leader. If I ever encounter a hostile teleporter, then he'll probably be trying to kill me. In which case, I suppose a bullet would secure him pretty well."

Dan rolled his eyes. "Thanks. That's super helpful."

"I believe we have a small supply of subdermal trackers in the precinct armory," Gregoir rumbled, walking forward alongside Abby and Freya, now that the fight had ended. "Should a teleporter be taken into custody for something minor, they would be implanted until their court date. Assuming they can make bail."

"Oh yeah," Cornelius said. "I forgot about those. Hell, if someone's willing to dig out a chunk of their thigh in order to escape a trial, more power to 'em I guess."

"But to answer your question, Daniel," Gregoir continued, "simply blindfolding a teleporter is usually sufficient to 'secure' them. That, and handcuffs. Few are capable of teleporting blindly as safely as you are." He flashed Dan an encouraging thumbs up. "The mutation you experienced was most beneficial!"

"I think we used to have one of those... barometric chambers? Hyper-baro-turbo-pressure device?" Cornelius babbled absently. "I forget the name. It was a room that slowly increased the pressure within. Like a deep dive? If you left it too quickly you... well, basically you died. That's where we used to stash people with hyper-mobility. I think it only ever saw use three or four times?" He nodded to himself, clicking his tongue. "Yeah, three times. I remember, because it got decommissioned after the third prisoner killed himself." Cornelius shook his head. "Criminals never listen."

"That's pretty grim," Dan commented.

Cornelius shrugged, then grinned. "But we're getting off topic! Daniel, good idea going for the grapple, even if it wouldn't have worked."

"Seemed to work okay to me," Dan replied.

Connor shook his head. "You surprised me, but I would've broken out fairly quickly. My power gives me effectively perfect leverage."

"I noticed that," Dan said. "You were moving more like one of those whack-wavy-inflatable-arm-flailing-tube-men than an actual person. Just popping up and down without any real regard to physics."

Connor flexed. "My power allows me to redirect physical forces affecting my body. I can absorb hits by distributing the force evenly across my entire self, and I can constantly speed up by harnessing the planet's gravity."

"Yeah, I had honestly forgotten about that last bit," Dan laughed. He had a vague memory of Connor pinballing off the walls of his basement, that was drowned in a drunken haze.

"Regardless, I think the two of you sparring is slightly pointless," Cornelius interjected. "Dan, you have no way of actually hurting Connor without using a weapon of some kind, and Connor, you have no way of actually landing a hit on Daniel."

"It's more a way to blow off steam than anything else," Dan replied.

"Of course." Cornelius strolled towards the center of the lawn, pulling off the velcro straps of his Kevlar vest. He tossed it aside, and began to loosen the buttons of his shirt. "But there's always an opportunity to train while having fun. So why don't we try this again."

He cast off his shirt, revealing the body of Adonis. He grinned widely, falling into a stance that Dan vaguely recognized.

"You two, against me."